The Thinking Muslim

Apologies for the slight deterioration in sound, especially in the first 30 minutes of the interview.

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The ongoing slaughter in Gaza and now the carpet bombing of Lebanon has at its backdrop the US elections. Both Kamala Harris and Donald Trump have clearly stated their intentions to back Israel, and it is hard sometimes to place a cigarette paper between them.

So how should American Muslims respond to the genocide. Should they abandon Harris? I am planning to visit the US very soon inshallah and will be meeting with American Muslim leaders and others as I attempt to piece together an answer to these crucial questions. But to begin the conversation, I have invited back onto the show Sami Hamdi to share his thoughts.

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0:00 – Introduction

03:00 Is there a Harris bounce in the polls

07:06 If Harris loses, Zionism loses?

13:34 Why is AIPAC worried?

20:00 Shifting US public opinion

26:58 Muslims in swing states

30:01 Supporting Trump

38:19 Third-party candidates

48:21 Should we endorse Jill Stein

57:39 The lesser of the two evils

1:18:00 Are US Muslims ready for sacrifice

1:39:40 Non-Muslim allies

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Sami Hamdi has been at the fore of the conversation about how Muslims should respond to the unparalleled attack upon Gaza. The brutality with which the Israelis now act with impunity is clear for the majority of the world to see, but the West remains immune to its crimes. That’s partly because the West does not and cannot see Israel as anything but a benevolent project in a region that requires a Western presence. A colony. An imperial parasite whose crimes are erased by those funding its campaign of annihilation. Israel is not, as the conventional wisdom suggests, out of control. It is a project of the West. The West is Israel and Israel is the West. The two are symbiotically linked. Their destiny is one.

This past week, we have seen the latest escalation, the systematic use of communications pagers and walk-in talkies to kill and maim indiscriminately across Lebanon and parts of Syria. The response in much of the Western press has been to praise the action as creative and daring. But what lay behind this escalation, what is Israel’s game plan, and where do the Muslim rulers now sit, almost a year after this act of mass murder?

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0:00 – Introduction

2:20 – Why did Israel do this?

10:25 – Netanyahu’s calculation with Iran

15:14 – Role of the US in this crisis

19:47 – US involvement

22:07 – Iranian restraint

28:05 – How do we view what happened

31:38 – Was Syria US inspired?

38:00 – Did Iran help the Syrians?

46:09 – Saudi Arabia and Normalisation

53:19 – Erdoğan and Türkiye

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The Sunni Shia divide remains an open wound and a means by which our enemies meddle in our internal affairs. Since the war on terror, and the horrible sectarianism unleashed on Iraq, this divide has got even bigger and has often led to bloody violence. However, amidst this turmoil, we often hear voices from within the Ummah and beyond, dreaming of unity to confront the misery, humiliation, and suffering of the oppressed, especially in the current situation with Palestine. But it’s a difficult topic, there are a host of theological and political concerns and the current tussle between Saudi Arabia and Iran makes any talk of reconciliation or an overlapping consensus politically charged.

Dr Suwaidan is a profile writer, speaker, trainer and in many ways has brought much needed intellectual thought to our age.

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0:00 – Introduction

1:55 – Iraq: Framing sectarianism

10:00 – Iran’s Shia exceptionalism

15:30 – Iran and Shia not the same

16:48 – Why do we need unity?

21:03 – Overlapping consensus?

22:06 – How do we do this?

24:32 – Declaring takfir and abuse of companions

31:44 – A major cultural shift?

33:50 – Our enemies using our division

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It is said a people without a past are a lost soul. And in today’s turbulent world, the Muslim ummah has come to realise that we have, in many cases, been taught a version of history that fails to appreciate what the late Shabbir Akhtar called Islam as a imperial faith.

Dr Yakoob Ahmed is an academic specialising in late Ottoman history. He was until recently a lecturer in Islamic history at Istanbul University. He is a regular to this podcast and writes and lectures extensively on Ottoman history. He is the author of a soon to be published title, Does History Matter – history done islamically - the conversation of today.

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0:00 Introduction

2:00 Gaza at the crossed roads

8:08 History as a vocation

11:08 Islam as an Imperial Faith

14:40 Historians providing solutions

19:48 What are we doing wrong with history?

25:26 Idealism?

32:50 The Quran and History

37:32 Ibn Khuldun’s cyclical theory

43:22 Islam and the production of knowledge

50:40 Fiction and Ertrugul

55:20 Islamic method of history?

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Gaza has been a hurtful experience. This year we saw the passing of a milestone, 100 years without a central leadership. The last Ottoman Caliphate, with all its faults, remained a global force and acted as a shield for this ummah. So why have we declined to such a degree that it seems our leadership is inept and our ummah has not moved over Gaza. And what now can we do about it?

Dr Tareq al-Suwaidan is a prolific writer, speaker, trainer and in many ways has brought much needed intellectual thought to our age.

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0:00 Introduction

2:21 – Why has the ummah not moved?

7:18 – is it s leadership issue

12:10 – Western interference?

14:10 – Excuses of the rulers

17:03 – Decline inevitable?

25:28 – Prophetic method

34:25 – Do we need a new leader?

37:41 – Muslim political unity

42:58 – Poor scholarship

51:55 – Responding to Gaza’s pain

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Today, The United States strides the globe as one of the world's most powerful empires ever witnessed. Its hegemonic ambition, devised after the Second World War and consolidated with the untimely fall of the Soviet Union, knows little limits. With a litany of military bases, a network of alliances, an international economic architecture that places it at the centre of the world economy and enormous structural power in the form of global institutions, its empire is all-encompassing.

My guest this week is Matt Kennard; he argues there is a global network of elites who do the bidding for this empire. While working for the Financial Times as an investigative journalist, he had unbridled access to the crème de la crème of the global elite. He is the author of The Racket, A Rogue Reporter vs the American Empire; Matt is a Co-Founder and head of investigations at Declassified UK.

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For a conscientious Muslim, managing ones money in the West can be a difficult prospect. Islam has a series of rules to do with money, the prohibition of riba (interest) being the key one, and rules on trade that often places it at odds with a rather laissez faire Neo liberal model. Muslims feel a sense of unease when we place our money in banks or engage is investment opportunities that may contravene Islamic precepts.

Our guest today was an Islamic finance industry insider. Harris Irfan is currently the CEO of Cordoba Capital Markets. He has 29 years of investment banking and consulting experience. He was the former co-founder of Deutsche Bank's world-leading Islamic finance team and CEO of Deutsche's Islamic finance subsidiary. He is the Former Global Head of Islamic Finance at Barclays, then Head of Investment Banking for the Rasmala group. He is also the author of "Heaven's Bankers: Inside the Hidden World of Islamic Finance", the critically acclaimed best-seller about the Islamic finance industry.

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Until last week, all the talk in the west was that of a developing ceasefire agreement for Gaza. That talk is now about a regional conflict. The lead negotiator, Ismail Haniyah, May Allah have mercy on him and accord to him the status of shahadah, was assassinated in an audacious attack in Tehran. This follows the death of a high-profile commander, Fuad Shukr, in the southern suburbs of Beirut. There are now fears that the conflict will escalate and more directly involve Iran. Already, Hasan Nasrallah, leader of Hezbollah, has talked of revenge, and so have the Iranians.

To help us navigate this evolving crisis, I am pleased to have Dr Azzam Tamimi back on our show. A political analyst and expert in the region and author on a well researched book on the group Hamas. He joins us today online from Jordan,

It must be made clear that this show is an analytical show and in no way represents an acceptance of the tactics and methods of any organisation discussed. It is our editorial decision to engage in a conversation about the current events as an exercise in informing our audience. We remain completely against any tactic that undermines the sanctity of all human life.

Timestamps:

0:00 Introduction

2:00 Why did they escalate at this time

5:44 Iran’s lapse in security

7:20 Iran’s response

10:14 Is Iran serious about resistance

12:05 Netanyahu regional war?

14:05 Trump and Isreal

16:56 Harris and Israel Policy

22:12 Muslims and US elections

24:29 Khalid Mashal

28:04 Ceasefire prospects

29:34 China’s role

32:31 What can we do?

36:58 Ismail Haniyeh

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To help us understand the situation in Bangladesh after the student protests, journalist and commentator Dilly Hussain joins us. Dilly is known for his public engagements, his fearless contribution to Muslim conversation, and his editorship of 5pillars.

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#thethinkingmuslimpodcast episode 160

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The Quran is the majestic word of Allah (swt), it gives Muslims life. In the Quran, Allah speaks to all human beings and those that read the Quran revere the majesty of its style and prose. Professor Muhammad A. S. Abdel Haleem is the Professor of Islamic Studies and director of the Centre for Islamic Studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies of London University, as well as editor of the Journal of Qur’anic Studies. Born in Egypt, he learned the Qur’an by heart during childhood. Haleem has published two translations of the Qur'an including the wonderful The Qur'an: A New Translation (2004).

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